


Lighthouse

by Coeurire



Category: The Penumbra Podcast
Genre: Established Relationship, F/F, Fluff and Hurt/Comfort, Hurt/Comfort, Mild Self Harm, canon-typical trauma
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-24
Updated: 2020-06-24
Packaged: 2021-03-04 04:00:58
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,112
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24897343
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Coeurire/pseuds/Coeurire
Summary: Vespa, struggling with unreality, calls out for Buddy.
Relationships: Buddy Aurinko/Vespa
Comments: 5
Kudos: 27





	Lighthouse

Vespa washed her face, then looked at herself in the mirror. Then washed it again, looked again. She splashed cold water on her face, and scrubbed until her cheeks were raw and her hands were covered with dead skin. 

“I’m here,” she said, out loud. “I’m here. This is real. I couldn’t do this if this was a dream. I couldn’t feel the water,” she added shakily, “if I was hallucinating.” But it wasn’t enough. She teetered on the edge of reality, close to falling off it. Her mind felt foggy and her body felt like it was inside a cloud. She could see her hands, she could see her face in the mirror, but they just didn’t add up to a whole person. 

“I’m here. I’m Vespa.” 

She wasn’t. She was back in Cerberus. She had never left at all. That reflection wasn’t her, it was just a hallucination. She could blink at any moment and it could shatter, or turn into hundreds of spiders. She wrapped her arms around herself and scratched down them, hard. 

“Buddy?” she called from the bathroom. “Buddy?” She was afraid to open the door, afraid that it wouldn’t really open into the darkened room with its comfortable queen bed and Buddy’s warm, welcoming arms. “Buddy!” she shouted. There was pleasure and satisfying pain in shouting the name, a name she’d shouted until her voice went hoarse so many times before, so she shouted it over and over until she became aware of the banging on the door. 

“Vespa!” her girlfriend called back to her as soon as she stopped shouting. “I’m here. Please let me in, the door’s locked.” 

Vespa turned to the door. So it was. Her hands trembled as she undid the lock. There might well have been nothing there once it opened, nothing but irradiated wasteland and sandy hell. Well, whatever it was, she’d be ready for it. She stepped back from the door and clenched her fists, ready to do anything she needed to the vision or person that walked through the door. 

There was no vision. There was nothing to fight. There was only Buddy, red hair a tangled mess that she’d still managed to press over the side of her face she wanted no one to see, and the darkened room behind her. Vespa barely had time to look at her before the other woman was holding her, arms wrapped around her and squeezing tightly, too tightly, as if she too was trying to make sure Vespa was really there. 

“Vespa!” she cried. “Vespa, darling, are you alright? It’s four-thirty in the morning.” 

“I had to pee,” said Vespa, which was true. Her bodily functions didn’t take her discomfort with these hours of the night into account. Then, aloud, to herself, she said, “I couldn’t feel Buddy if she wasn’t real. I’m Vespa. I’m here. There’s nothing outside the door.” 

“Do you want me to shut the door?” asked Buddy. 

Vespa nodded. 

“I have to let go of you to do it.” The arms encircling Vespa were gone for a moment, then back again when the door clicked shut. 

Vespa stiffened under the hug. “Wait,” she said. “Let me look at you.” 

Buddy nodded, and stepped back. Vespa got a good look. She hid half of her face, but that part wasn’t worrying now that Vespa knew what was under there  _ (wouldn’t know what was under there if this wasn’t real). _ She wore a simple nightgown, but it looked so elegant on her, complementing her bright hair and her brighter eyes, which were now worried and looked like they might be holding back tears. She had lost weight in the years since they’d been together, probably because of her food allergy.  _ Would see her as you remembered her if this wasn’t real.  _

“Let me know when you’re finished,” said Buddy. “Or if you need me to twirl. That was a joke. The twirling part, I mean.” 

Vespa stared at her for another few seconds, eyes wide. “Sit on the floor with me,” she said.   
Buddy went down in an instant. Vespa sat beside her, feeling the cool tile floor through her own nightgown. She put her arms around Buddy, who responded in kind, wrapping one hand around Vespa’s face and stroking her hair. 

“Vespa, my love,” she said, “what do you need? I’ll do anything for you.” 

“I just sort of…” The bathroom seemed to grow and shrink around them. Vespa squeezed her eyes shut and tried to focus on the warmth of Buddy’s shoulder, the feeling of her hands in her hair. “...I got worried,” she said. “I worried that none of this is real. That I’m going to wake up tomorrow, or wake up right now.” 

“I’m here. You’re safe,” said Buddy, and Vespa flinched at the word “safe.” How many times had Buddy told her that, when it wasn’t really her? 

“Don’t say that,” she said through gritted teeth. “Don’t say I’m safe. Just tell me we’re here and you love me.” 

“Vespa, I love you. We’re here, in our bathroom in  _ our  _ apartment, and I love you. I love you so, so much.” 

Vespa heard the catch in her partner’s voice. “If you start crying, I’ll start crying,” she warned.

Buddy laughed. “I love you, Vespa,” she said again, and this time she was definitely crying. “When I heard you yelling, I was so worried--I thought you were hurt, or, I don’t even know--I’m just glad you’re okay. And I’m here for you. Whatever you need, seriously, anything.” 

Feeling a tear trickle down her cheek, Vespa nodded, and buried her face in Buddy’s shoulder. She smelled like cotton and lavender, like sweat and herself, a new scent that Vespa was already getting used to.

“I just need you to stay here with me for a while,” she told Buddy. “Maybe until morning.” 

“That’s okay. We can go to bed early tomorrow night. Or tonight, I guess.” Buddy pressed a kiss to the top of her head. 

Vespa clung to her tightly. Buddy responded in kind, tightening the arm she had around her partner’s shoulder. She kissed her again and again, all over her head.

“I love you,” she said again and again. “I’m here, and you’re here, and I love you.” 

It wasn’t the first night this had happened, nor would it be the last, nor did Buddy’s presence fully bring her back to reality. They sat like that for a long time, holding each other on the cold tile floor, and while they sat Vespa was still afraid, still foggy. 

But Buddy was with her, the lighthouse guiding her through the fog. 

**Author's Note:**

> Twitter: Coeurire  
> Tumblr: mothbutterfly   
> Dreamwidth: Bellsprouting
> 
> Thanks to lurking_umbra for the beta!


End file.
